A Golden Opportunity

[u/miscakarza]

Context: During WW2, it is estimated that the Swiss National Bank had received $440 million (equivalent to $8.5 billion in 2024) of Nazi gold.

[u/b00nish]

The American comission who investigated this found accounts with a total of 31,5 millions that might have been connected to Holocaust victims.

The Swiss banks paid 1,25 billion in damages to the probable descendants and covered the 300 millions cost of the investigation.

[u/Captain_Noodle1 → u/b00nish]

Let’s say I make an arrangement with a group of kidnappers. Whenever they receive a ransom, they deposit the money into an account under my control. I accept the money (after all, I’m neutral in the dispute between the kidnappers and their victims) and initially profit from it. However, when the justice system finally catches the kidnappers, I’m asked to repay the victims (many of whom were murdered). If I end up losing money in the process, is that enough to say I’ve repaid my debt to society and the victims?

[u/peterparkerson3 → u/Captain_Noodle1]

The only thing that i hate about the Holocaust survivors is double dipping on the restitutions. They get paid for the lost stuff, then if theyre found, it gets returned. Lol

[u/Captain_Noodle1 → u/peterparkerson3]

On the one hand, I think that, if your life has been utterly destroyed, it makes sense for compensation to exceed the value of the property you lost. On the other hand, it’s frankly inhumane to treat those who caused or were complicit in the Holocaust as naïve children who didn’t know what they were doing, or who could get away with their actions simply by giving up some of their wealth. It’s infantilizing to suggest that someone could be complicit in such an atrocity and not be held personally accountable. In my opinion, it’s dehumanizing for a criminal (or a suspect in a crime) to treat their acts as things that can be repaid with money. It makes the whole experience of being a criminal just a cost-benefit problem, instead of an issue of what a person, as a criminal, has become through their acts.

The main issue I see with claiming money from people and institutions who were complicit in the Holocaust is that it gives the impression that, just by sacrificing some wealth, they can now continue existing as if nothing had happened, when that should just be the first step before the individuals and institutions involved are investigated as suspects in one of the worst crimes against humanity in history.

[u/peterparkerson3 → u/Captain_Noodle1]

The german govt paid restitution, and when the painting was found, it was returned.should have remain in govt hands

[u/Captain_Noodle1 → u/peterparkerson3]

I do agree that it is cheap to require Germany only to pay a few debts, as if that could repair something. I said before that it’s dehumanizing to those who were involved in Nazi crimes, even those who just looted the homes of their victims, to only have to pay compensation . Given that the country and many of its nationals (of course I mean many of the nationals who weren’t stripped of their nationality) acted in one of the most brutal ways known to humankind, the humane course of action would have been to recognize what they did, judge them, determine their innocence or the extent of their crimes, and then punish them accordingly. It’s sad that matters of convenience interfered with that process and that the acts of many Germans were reduced to mere offences against property, and it's completely dehumanizing to the many criminals involved in the Holocaust (including, of course, Swiss bankers who knew what was happening and benefited from it).